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Resolved, That copies of the Declaration be sent to the several assemblies, conventions, and committees, or councils of safety, and to the several commanding officers of the continental troops; that it be proclaimed in each of the United States, and at the head of the army.

CHAPTER XVI.

CONFEDERATION.

COMMITTEE ON CONFEDERATION APPOINTED BEFORE THE DECLARATION WAS ADOPTED
-ITS REPORT-DEBATE ON THE PLAN OF CONFEDERATION-PROPORTION OF TAX-
ATION-REMARKS OF MR. CHASE-JOHN ADAMS-MR. HARRISON-MR. PAYNE-
DR. WITHERSPOON-DEBATE ON STATE VOTES IN CONGRESS-REMARKS OF MR.
CHASE-DR. FRANKLIN-DR. WITHERSPOON-JOHN
-JOHN ADAMS—MR. HOPKINS-
MR. WILSON—ADOPTION OF THE CONFEDERATION—ITS VALUE.

WHILE the Declaration of Independence was still under the consideration of Congress, certain necessary measures were taken towards the forming of a plan of confederation among the colonies. On the 11th of June 1776, it was resolved that a committee should be appointed to propose and digest a form of confederation. On the following day, it was resolved that the committee should consist of a member from each colony, and it was appointed accordingly.

On the 12th of July, eight days after the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, the committee appointed to draw Articles of Confederation made their report, and the subject was from time to time debated in a committee of the whole, until the 15th of November 1777, when a copy of the original draft, with a few verbal amendments only, was by Congress ordered to be sent to the legis latures of all the United States to be by them considered, in order that if it should meet their approbation they might authorize their delegates to ratify the same in Congress. On the 17th of November a circular letter was approved and ordered to be sent to the several States, with copies of the Confederation; and on the 29th a committee was appointed to procure a translation of it into French, and to report an address to the inhabitants of Canada &c. Thus the plan of Confederation passed for the present from the hands of Congress

to the States, with whom alone rested its final acceptance or rejection.

In Congress, as we learn from the valuable notes of Mr. Jefferson, the discussion turned chiefly on those articles which determined the proportion, or quota of money, which each State should furnish to the common treasury, and the manner of voting in Congress. The first of these articles was, in the original draft, expressed in these words.

“Art. XI. All charges of war, and all other expenses that shall be incurred for the common defence, or general welfare, and allowed by the United States assembled, shall be defrayed out of a common treasury, which shall be supplied by the several colonies in proportion to the number of inhabitants of every age, sex, and quality, except Indians not paying taxes, in each colony-a true amount of which, distinguishing the white inhabitants, shall be triennially taken and transmitted to the Assembly of the United States."

Mr. CHASE moved that the quotas should be fixed, not by the number of the inhabitants of every condition, but by that of the "white inhabitants." He admitted that taxation should always be in proportion to property; that this was, in theory, the true rule; but that, from a variety of difficulties, it was a rule which could never be adopted in practice. The value of the property in every State could never be estimated justly and equally. Some other measures for the wealth of the state must, therefore, be devised, some standard referred to, which would be more simple. He considered the number of inhabitants a tolerably good criterion of property, and that this might always be obtained. He therefore thought it the best mode that we could adopt, with one exception only: he observed that negroes are property, and, as such, cannot be distinguished from the lands or personalities held in those States where there are few slaves; that the surplus of profit which a Northern farmer is able to lay by, he invests in cattle, horses &c., whereas a Southern farmer lays out the same surplus in slaves. There is no more reason, therefore, for taxing the Southern States on the farmer's head, and on his slave's head, than the Northern ones on their farmers' heads and the heads of their cattle; that the method proposed would, therefore, tax the Southern States on their numbers and their wealth conjunctly, while the Northern would be taxed on numbers only; that negroes,

in fact, should not be considered as members of the state more than cattle, and that they have no more interest in it.

Mr. JOHN ADAMS observed, that the numbers of people are taken by this article, as an index of the wealth of the State, and not as subjects of taxation; that, as to this matter, it was of no consequence by what name you called your people, whether by that of freemen or of slaves; that in some countries the laboring poor are called freemen, in others they were called slaves; but that the difference as to the state was imaginary only. What matters it whether a landlord, employing ten laborers on his farm, give them annually as much money as will buy them the necessaries of life, or give them those necessaries at short hand? The ten laborers give as much wealth to the state, increase its exports as much in the one case as the other. Certainly five hundred freemen produce no more profits, no greater surplus for the payment of taxes, than five hundred slaves. Therefore the state in which are the laborers called freemen, should be taxed no more than that in which are those called slaves. Suppose, by an extraordinary operation of nature or of law, one half of the laborers of a state could, in the course of one night, be transformed into slaves; would the state be made poorer or less able to pay taxes? That the condition of the laboring poor in most countries that of the fishermen, particularly, of the Northern States-is as abject as that of slaves. It is the number of laborers which produces the surplus for taxation, and numbers, therefore, indiscriminately, are the fair index to wealth; that it is the use of the word "property" here in its application to some of the people of the state which produces the fallacy. How does the Southern farmer procure slaves? Either by importation, or by purchase from his neighbor. If he imports a slave, he adds one to the number of laborers in his country, and proportionally to its profits and ability to pay taxes. If he buys from his neighbor, it is only a transfer of a laborer from one farm to another, which does not change the annual produce of the state, and therefore should not change its tax; that if a Northern farmer works ten laborers on his farm, he can, it is true, invest the surplus of ten men's labor in cattle; but so may the Southern farmer working ten slaves; that a state of one hundred thousand freemen can maintain no more cattle than

one of one hundred thousand slaves, therefore they have no more of that kind of property. That a slave may, indeed, from the custom of speech, be more properly called the wealth of his master, than the free laborer might be called the wealth of his employer; but as to the state, both were equally its wealth, and should therefore equally add to the quota of its tax.

Mr. HARRISON proposed, as a compromise, that two slaves should be counted as one freeman. He affirmed that slaves did not do as much work as freemen, and doubted if two effected more than one; that this was proved by the price of labor-the hire of a laborer in the Southern colonies being from £8 to £12, while in the Northern it was generally £24.

Mr. WILSON said that if this amendment should take place, the Southern colonies would have all the benefit of slaves, whilst the Northern ones would bear the burden; that slaves increase the profits of a state, which the Southern States mean to take to themselves; that they also increase the burden of defence, which would, of course, fall so much heavier on the Northern; that slaves occupy the places of freemen and eat their food. Dismiss your slaves, and freemen will take their places. That other kinds of property were pretty equally distributed through all the colonies; there were as many cattle, horses, and sheep in the North as the South, and South as the North; but not so as to slaves;-that experience has shown those colonies have been always able to pay most which have the most inhabitants, whether they be black or white; and the practice of the Southern colonies has always been to make every farmer pay poll taxes upon his laborers, whether they be black or white. He acknowledged that freemen work the most; but they consume the most also. They do not produce a greater surplus for taxation. The slave is neither fed nor clothed so expensively as a freeman. Again, white women are exempted from labor generally, but negro women are not. In this, then, the Southern States had an advantage as the Article now stands. It has sometimes been said that slavery is necessary because the commodities they raise would be too dear for market if cultivated by freemen; but now it is said that the labor of the slave is the dearest.

Mr. PAYNE urged the original resolutions of Congress, to proportion the quotas of the States to the number of souls.

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